That was different.

Based upon Paul Carter’s LRB-365 and Base Building – dealing with ankle injury

• Chins
  • BW x 1
  • BW x 1
  • BW x 1
  • BW x almost 1
  • BW x almost 1 (yes, I suck)
• Pendlay Rows
  • 115 x 8
  • 115 x 8
  • 115 x 8
  • 115 x 8
  • 115 x 8
• Shrugs
  • 135 x 20
  • 135 x 20
  • 135 x 20
  • 135 x 20
• Close-grip Pulldowns
  • 110 x 8
  • 120 x 8
  • 130 x 8
  • 130 x 8
• BB Curls
  • 20 x 100
• Kettlebell (well, dumbbell) swings
  • 40# db
  • swing for 30 seconds, rest for 30 seconds
  • 6 times
• Foam Rolling

Today was interesting on a few levels.

First, doing just a “back/pull” workout was novel, as I’ve been so used to doing upper body work all on the same day. And in a weird way, it didn’t feel like I got enough volume. I suspect that’s in part because I suck at chin-ups. As you can see, I could get 1 good one, then could get my chin almost to the bar but not over it… yeah, I suck. I made the best of it tho, making sure to do very slow negatives (e.g. 10 count to lower myself). I will eventually not suck…. either because I got stronger, or because I’ve lost enough weight, or preferrably both. 🙂

So due to the lack of volume there, I’m not doing the template precisely as Paul laid out — added (and going to keep adding) extra sets on the other exercises just to get enough volume. A lot of this week wasn’t about being productive as much as figuring out the program.

Some weights were good, others were adjusted. I actually think the heavy pulldowns won’t happen, but not sure. My shoulders did not like them, but I’m not sure if it’s true dislike or just that I usually do pulldowns with lighter weight for more reps. I will play with this.

I might actually see about doing the rows less strict with more weight then the pulldowns stricter, lighter, more reps.

My ankle was fine with all of this, which was relevant. I mean, holding that 135# for the shrugs was no problem (tho I picked the bar off a rack, not the floor, just to be safe). Hopefully this means I can do a little more work and my ankle be happy.

And with that, by welcome timing T-Nation posted an article yesterday about “maximal fat loss, minimal equipment“. In short, kettlebell swings with some other work. See, I can’t really do much for cardio because it all involves things that my ankle can’t really handle right now (e.g. sprints aren’t going to happen, farmers walks neither, jumping, running, etc..). But this? This I can do. There’s no movement, and frankly if I can’t do these for some ankle or other physical reason, then I can’t deadlift nor squat either, y’know? While the gym doesn’t have any kettlebells, I just held a dumbbbell and did the same motion. I opted to start simple today and just swing: 30 seconds of swing, 30 seconds of rest. I was aiming for 10 minutes, but after 6 rounds enough things in my body said “stop, else you risk hurting something”. I’ll work up to it. I figure if I can work up to 10 minutes of this, then I can up the weight, then I can up the intensity with other things.

This I can do.

I may wind up hating it. But you know, I’m getting enough stuff put in front of my face that are saying “suck it up, man”. By chance I reread something from Dave Tate where he spoke about how he couldn’t squat… back could squat a grand, but the rest of him couldn’t, beause his abs sucked. He hates sled drags, he hates ab work, but he did it because he knew he had to — and he was happy with the end results. And so yeah, that’s what I need. My end results are leaning out, and if shit like KB swings or other cardio will get me there? Suck it up. And if KB swings can be intensive enough cardio that I can do it for 10-15 minutes 3x week (end of each gym session) and be done? fine… better than 60 boring minutes on a treadmill.

Gonna give it a try.

Wow. Talk about good timing.

This article on Ankle Mobility was just published by Juggernaut Training Systems. After feeling how things went at the gym this morning, it was evident I have dorsiflexion issues. I just couldn’t get things down and forward far enough.

So trying the little “are you flexible enough?” test outlined in the article? Right foot is fine. Left foot… ha ha ha, not even. But I can’t tell how much of that might be how things are (i.e. if I tried this 2 months ago, how would I have been) or how much is because of the injury. My guess is much of it is from the injury because I didn’t feel these issues when squatting prior to the injury.

Anyways, some good exercises in here, many of which are stretches. I was already thinking that would need to be a bigger part of my rehab, given my experiences this morning, well… more fuel for the fire.

 

Man… this sucks. 🙂

Based upon Paul Carter’s LRB-365 and Base Building – dealing with ankle injury

• Squat
  • BW x 10
  • BW x 10
  • Bar x 10
  • Bar x 10
  • Bar x 10
• Deadlift
  • 65 (bar + 10# bumpers) x 10
  • 65 x 10
  • 65 x 10
• Leg Extensions
  • 50 x 15
  • 50 x 15
  • 50 x 15
  • 50 x 15
  • 50 x 15
• Leg Curls
  • 50 x 15
  • 50 x 12
  • 40 x 12
  • 40 x 12
  • 40 x 12
• Hyperextensions
  • BW x 10
  • BW x 10
  • BW x 10
• Standing Calf Raises
  • 20 x 10
  • 20 x 10
• 10 minutes on the elliptical

Ugh. 🙂

I knew today would be no fun. But I have to tell myself if I want to get back to lifting heavier weights, I need to ensure the ankle heals well.

Squats — they actually didn’t feel too good. It’s a few things. First, the extent of flexion the foot goes into when you’re in the hole? That was a lot. It felt odd, it hurt a bit, and I found myself wanting to lean right to relieve the pressure — maybe not a real need to, maybe more mental fear of reinjury. When I forced myself to be fully relaxed and just go up and down, weight on my heels, it wasn’t so bad. I’ve been doing lots of circles and rotational type stuff, and static “stands” on my ankle, but not enough stretching and bending with resistance. While at the gym I ordered a set of surgical tubing of varying “weight” (hooray for mobile phones and Amazon!). I’ll add more stretches and such band resistance work into my at-home rehab work. Talking with a friend of mine that has plantar fasciitis, he says calf stretches help him a lot, so that might have double benefit for me.

Second, I felt lots of lateral stress on the ankle, throughout all things I did today… mostly squats and the hypers. Playing with foot position helped, but it does tell me I’m not ready to put a couple hundred pounds on my back just yet. 🙂

Deadlifting went well. No pains, no problems. I hated only moving 65#, but again, today was about finding where I am and what I can and cannot do. I really want to up the weight here, but I know of course that will put stress on the ankle. I might start a slow creep tho, like put the bumpers on with a 25# plate or something. I do need some level of stress to force the body to adapt, just can’t be too much. Must be slow, must restrain, even if it’s so damn boring and un-fun.

Doing extensions and curls were just an attempt to get SOME sort of actual leg work in. Do them slow, squeeze at the top, etc.. Made sure the bar/pad was at the top of my high-tops, not actually hooked into the ankle area.

I wanted hypers to be AMRAP, but again that lateral stress feeling wasn’t too great so I just did 10 and stopped. Again, these were very slow controlled movements. Which is good, I think. Gets me in the mode of feeling the muscle, not the movement.

Calf raises tho. The intent here was NOT to move much weight at all — to get the stretch, to work the range of motion. I planned on 3 sets, but after 2 well… something said stop, so I did. It’s not worth pushing it (because I even have a mild wondering if seated calf raises contributed to my problem in the first place).

Heck, I even spent 10 of the longest minutes of my life on the elliptical. Mild incline, mild resistance, mostly to give some extra work to the ankle. Steady pace, like 130 BPM heart rate, got some 1200 strides in. Again, nothing major, just trying to add some help to the ankle rehab.

I’ll get there… eventually. 🙂

Trying a new program

Based upon Paul Carter’s LRB-365 and Base Building – dealing with ankle injury

• Incline Press
  • 45 x 10
  • 45 x 10
  • 75 x 5
  • 95 x 4
  • 115 x 3
  • 145 x 2
  • 165 x 1
  • 135 x 15
  • 135 x 8
• DB Bench Press
  • 50 x 10
  • 50 x 10
  • 40 x 10
  • 40 x 10
  • 40 x 10
• Behind the Neck Press
  • 45 x 8
  • 65 x 8
  • 70 x 8
• Seated DB Press
  • 20 x 10
  • 25 x 10
  • 30 x 10
  • 30 x 10
  • 30 x 10
• Rope Pushdowns
  • 15 x 100

So we start new.

I detailed the general plan for my next (well, this) phase of lifting. And today went well, all things considered.

I had no idea what weights would be optimal, so I just picked some numbers. Some things were a little heavy, some were a little light. While the intent of this program, following Paul Carter’s suggestions, is to go for reps before upping weight, you do have to ensure the weight is in the right spot to get the reps right. So, this week I expected to be somewhat going through the motions, finding my place, and next week will be a bit more on track (tho that too may have some slight refinements).

All in all, it felt good. For the longest time I’ve wanted to get more volume. It’s the closet bodybuilder, natch. Love working things further, deeper, more; love the pump; etc. So this felt good. Well, it also felt weird because I’ve worked chest and back together for so long, I’m used to feeling a pump all around my arms (biceps, triceps, forearms). Today? Just my triceps, and it felt strange to be “inflated” in one place but “deflated” in the other. 🙂

The BtNP was something I was unsure about, but it went alright. I did use the Smith Machine for it, because I have no spotter and wasn’t sure with equipment on hand how else I could manage the mechanics of it. I started very light (bar-only) and worked up a little bit. It actually went a lot better than expected. I am bummed with the Smith machine tho, mostly because the parts that hold the bar take up so much room that I can’t get quite wide enough grip. Oh well.

Anyways, all in all things were alright. Especially happy to have put little stress on my ankle.

We’ll just keep at this and see how it goes.

If you don’t like reading about my lifting, stop now. 🙂

This is me thinking out loud. This is my present line of thinking, and it may change. But with Monday almost upon me, I need some sort of plan. And who knows, I may change it after I try it — maybe a refinement, maybe starting over again. Who knows.

See, there are two key issues at play right now.

1. Fat loss (leaning out)
2. Ankle injury

Ok, there’s a third. I want to explore Paul Carter‘s stuff. Yeah, Cube is still interesting to me, but there’s no question Cube is strictly about powerlifting. Neither of my two key issues right now are conducive to powerlifting. I haven’t abandoned desire to explore Cube, but I need to be in a position where I can try it.

Fat loss remains my key focus right now. I will do this. I want to be lean.

If not for ankle injury, I’d probably follow the “conditioning” template right out of “Lift-Run-Bang 365”. It’s all about high reps, conditioning, fat loss. It’s precisely what I could use. However, the problem with so many things conditioning is — they require your legs and feet, and ankles. *sigh* Things like “walking like a gorilla” or a weighted vest? That’s more stress than I care to put on the injury. That isn’t to say I won’t eventually go here, I just can’t right now.

In fact, I can’t even really squat or deadlift. *double sigh*

When I look at the various ways to lift, actually there isn’t a lot I can do. But when I see what I can do and how it might work? Well, here we go.

The basic idea will come directly out of Paul’s Basebuilding book, the “mass building” phase. No, I’m not necessarily trying to build mass right now, because it’s hard (difficult? impossible?) to build mass without carb intake. However, in mass building you use lots of reps. That’s going to be less stress on my joints, less stress on my body, getting more blood flowing into areas. Plus, since I don’t typically work in those rep ranges, it’s going to help my body and mind get used to that (because I do want mass building to be my focus after I’m leaned out). Plus I am finding higher rep sessions are really tapping me out. If that can lead to more fat burning, great. I’m basically figuring this is going to be a help to me in all ways with my 2 key issues right now.

But I will evaluate as I go along.

Here’s the basic idea. Again, this is based upon the “mass phase” of Basebuilding, with some adjustments for 3 days instead of 4, and my injury.

Monday

Incline Press – 5,4,3,2,1, 1×8-15 + 50%

DB Bench Press – 5×10

Press Behind Neck – 2×8

Seated DB Press – 5×10

Pushdowns – either 5×20 or 100 reps, not sure which

The main purpose of Monday is “push”, so chest, shoulders, triceps. Small volume on the heavy stuff, then lots of volume on the other stuff. I do want the sets to be heavy, for those reps. I don’t want to do 5×10 and that 50th rep feel easy.

The behind the neck presses I’ll try. Paul speaks highly of them, and I’m willing to give it a shot and work my way up. I’m guessing they may be very light for a while, while I get used to the notion and find my groove.

Wednesday

This is going to be a leg day, but with my ankle, I can only do so much. I will however use this as a day to work my way into things, doing things I can’t do at home. So I’ll probably do things like empty-bar squats or maybe 95# on the bar — very light. I’ll put the light bumper plates on and do deadlifts. Things that make my body go through the motions, the full range of motion, but don’t offer lots of stress. Do it for something like 5×20 or whatever my ankle will tolerate.

Then do lots of extensions and curls for high reps. Some hyperextensions would be another way to hit some of those needed muscle groups, but this… since there’s some stress on the ankle for bracing, well, we’ll see.

And probably seated and/or standing calf raises. Very light to no weight here… thinking more rehab than actual building.

As I see what I can do, I’d love to add in some of the stuff Paul talks about on his conditioning program, like lunges or single-leg split squats.

I just want to do something, just very slow and conservative.

Friday

Chins – 5 sets of however many I can do. No bands. If I can’t do one, work on holds at the top and negatives.

Rows – 4×8 – some sort of row. BB rows would be best, but my ankle will dictate. Could be cable rows or db rows… whatever keeps my ankle happy.

Shrugs – 4×20 – again, whatever I have to do to keep my ankle happy (e.g. sit on the end of the bench and hold dumbbells off to the side)

Close-grip pulldowns – 3×8

BB curls – 5×20 or perhaps 100 reps

Supplemental

I plan on walking to/from the gym each time, and walking with more purpose.

I will do my specific ankle rehab exercises on the off days.

And… we’ll see how it goes.

Oh, this ankle….

• Bench Press – Reps
  • 45 x 10
  • 45 x 10
  • 95 x 10
  • 115 x 10
  • 135 x 10
  • 165 x 12
  • 165 x 10
  • 165 x 7
• Close-grip Bench Press
  • 175 x 6
  • 155 x 7
• Bench Press with 1″ pause off chest
  • 145 x 8 x 3
• Lat Pulldowns
  • 105 X 15
  • 105 X 15
  • 105 X 12
  • 100 X 12
• DB front raise
  • 15 x 10 x 3
• Fat-Man pullups
  • bw x 8 x 3
• Foam Rolling

Something happened yesterday while doing my ankle rehab work. I just got this wicked quick, sharp pain right in the area of the torn ligament. Yeah… that scared me. The pain went away after a bit, and this morning feels generally OK, but I can feel things aren’t totally hot. So I drove to/from the gym. I mean, everything at the gym was sitting or lying down really, so… I just kept awareness.

I do wonder about my bench technique. I thought I should look at going back to flat foot instead of tucking, but I wonder if that may be worse because that will put my foot into extension — which directly “stretches” the torn ligament. Tucking may be better, once I can do it without pain. So hell, I really don’t know right now. Just going to keep flat feet and my shins at a right angle to the floor… which will probably lead to some butt coming off the bench, but whatever right now.

Anyways….

Today’s session was taken right out of Cube Kingpin cycle 1 bench reps. I’m not sure if I overestimated my weights, if I overworked on the work-up sets, if it’s because I have no juice for reps due to the CarbNite stuff… but geez, you can see I lowered weights as I went along in hopes of getting the reps. *shrug* Just how it is right now. Just happy to get some work in.

Now that I know the story with my ankle, time to start some proper rehab.

I’m still not settled on a full program yet. Been so busy due to all my computer problems, I’m behind and playing catch up. My plan was to do this today, maybe tomorrow I’ll hit the gym again for a “rep day” Cube Kingpin style, then by Monday have a solid plan. I am thinking about following a Paul Carter approach. Something about the “man maker” template is appealing. It’s something like Monday is squat and deadlift, Wednesday is “push” (pressing, triceps), Friday is “pull” (back, biceps). But that you squat and deadlift on the same day… yeah. 🙂  But I don’t know. It may fare better for me to have a “leg day” twice a week. No matter what tho, the gym day would be to do gym-specific things; I do plan on doing at-home rehab work every day.

So with that.

I opted against going to the gym this morning. I have to start slow on this, and I know if I went to the gym I’d want to jump into things and try a bar on my back, 95 on my back, maybe not 135 today, but I know if I was good with 95 I’d grow that (over?) confidence. I need to force myself to go slow.

So I stayed home and did some very simple things. I did ankle rehab work like writing the alphabet with my big toe, windshield wipers, seated calf raises, supporting my bodyweight on one foot (steadying with my hand so my ankle doesn’t have to also deal with weight shifts due to balance). I also did some bodyweight squats and deadlifts (a couple sets of 10 each). Basically, put myself in the starting position for the lift, then just go through the motion to ensure I still have the range of motion, etc. Deadlifts were a little stiff, because that has a narrower stance and feet pointed more forward, so there’s certainly more flexion in the ankle joint — precisely what and into the area I’m dealing with. But it wasn’t bad. I also ensured to go slowly because as I’ve tried these over the past some days, I know I’ve been leaning right to take weight off my left foot — don’t want to do that. Sure, no pistol squats (not that I could do those anyways), but at least evenly distributed weight.

So, hardly a strenuous day, but I’ll keep doing these. The key will be working the ankle stuff into my daily life, so as I’m sitting at my desk working, I stretch, rotate, lift, support, etc.. But making sure I do NOT overdo it. Gotta be slow. Gotta be slow. Gotta hold back.